Beating the Good Pitchers

[sweaver]

If you aren't reading David Pinto's blog Baseball Musings on a daily basis, you should be. The guy may be the best general baseball writer going, including the ones who do it for money. Click on this and bookmark it: http://www.baseballmusings.com/

OK, now the reason for the thread, is that David has compiled the record of each team against the ERA leaders, the top 15 in ERA in each league. Hence the title of the thread. Here is the chart:

ERA Leaders vs.       W  L    Pct. GS    IP    ER    ERA
Indians              15  4   0.789 25  160.1   66   3.70
Rangers              30  9   0.769 45  296.1  112   3.40
Tigers               26  8   0.765 42  296.1   77   2.34
White Sox            18  6   0.750 28  193.2   76   3.53
Devil Rays           19  8   0.704 37  262.1   80   2.74
Pirates              14  6   0.700 25  164.1   60   3.29
Mets                 20  9   0.690 37  252.2   70   2.49
Brewers              17  8   0.680 32  215.2   64   2.67
Marlins              16  8   0.667 29  191.1   62   2.92
Royals               14  8   0.636 31  209.0   79   3.40
Athletics            14  8   0.636 31  202.2   76   3.38
Expos                 8  5   0.615 22  143.1   53   3.33
Rockies              11  7   0.611 25  157.2   77   4.40
Phillies             14  9   0.609 29  202.2   66   2.93
Orioles              14  9   0.609 33  217.2   75   3.10
Twins                18 12   0.600 37  257.1   83   2.90
Mariners             14 10   0.583 30  197.2   77   3.51
Padres               17 13   0.567 36  238.0   80   3.03
Reds                 13 10   0.565 32  211.0   67   2.86
Cubs                  9  7   0.563 25  162.2   51   2.82
Diamondbacks         10  8   0.556 24  167.0   52   2.80
Blue Jays            12 10   0.545 26  164.1   79   4.33
Angels               18 16   0.529 44  308.0  106   3.10
Astros               10 10   0.500 25  165.2   64   3.48
Dodgers              10 10   0.500 29  208.0   63   2.73
Yankees              14 14   0.500 34  223.1   93   3.75
Cardinals            10 12   0.455 33  208.1   67   2.89
Giants               11 15   0.423 34  224.0   99   3.98
Red Sox               8 12   0.400 30  196.1  104   4.77
Braves                8 14   0.364 32  204.0   86   3.79

If you make the playoffs, you face good pitchers, and so it is good to be at the bottom of this list. We knew the Braves and Red Sox had good offenses, but this shows they didn't just beat up on the patsies all year.

Also shows the Rangers and Angels led the league in starts against by quality pitchers. Comes from being in the same division as the A's and Mariners, no doubt.

[Wolf Hopper]

Where are all those people that love to shout "small sample size" at me, when I try something like this?

[SmedIndy]

I was at a conference!

[poorme]

if you sort by era and eliminate the extraneous stuff it makes a lot more sense. not sure what it tells you though.

ERA Leaders vs. ERA
Tigers 2.34
Mets 2.49
Brewers 2.67
Dodgers 2.73
Devil Rays2.74
Diamondb2.80
Cubs 2.82
Reds 2.86
Cardinals 2.89
Twins 2.90
Marlins 2.92
Phillies 2.93
Padres 3.03
Orioles 3.10
Angels 3.10
Pirates 3.29
Expos 3.33
Athletics 3.38
Rangers 3.40
Royals 3.40
Astros 3.48
Mariners 3.51
White Sox3.53
Indians 3.70
Yankees 3.75
Braves 3.79
Giants 3.98
Blue Jays 4.33
Rockies 4.40
Red Sox 4.77

[sweaver]

I think about this from time to time, partly because of what Peter Gammons said one day a few years ago on Baseball Tonight,"Wil Cordero hits the good pitchers," implying that some others with better stats were simply beating up on the patsies. Wolf has used that theme on a team basis sometimes this year, and when Pinto printed this chart I thought it had a place in the discussion.

I'd like to see a similar chart for hitters vs. the top pitchers.

[poorme]

i think there is some truth to idea that some players feast on the bum pitchers. seems to be patient power hitting types.

when facing your standard nasty stuff ace pitcher, guys who make contact and guys who go up there ready to swing seem to do better. a guy like cordero has a quick bat and he hacks so that sort of makes sense.

to find out if a team had this type of ability you'd have to compare how they do normally vs how they do against the top pitchers and use some sort of ratio or % difference.

[TimmyB]

Am I reading this correctly when I think this list suggests the Marlins shouldn't expect to go far in the playoffs against "good pitching"? And... on the flip side, we should expect the Braves and Red Sox to do well against good pitching?

It is a small sample size, but, if I've drawn the right conclusions, it's not surprising to see the teams that made the post-season. 4 of the top 5 are in the post-season.

As for Wolf's small sample size... agreed. However, welcome to the post-season, the mother of all small sample sizes. (The Braves certainly didn't look so hot against a "good" pitcher in game one.)

[sweaver]

It's a relatively small sample size, but it's between 22 and 45 games for everybody.

If fact, the simple number of games alone is an interesting number, to see who faced the "good" pitchers more times. The Expos had the lowest number, at 22.

[Joseph]

Yesterday, near the end of the Sox's 5-1 loss to Oakland the radio announcer implied that the Red Sox's offensive numbers were so good because they had been beating up on the leagues weaker pitchers.

This is a neat chart, but as mentioned the small sample size makes it partially meaningless